


disintegrating trees (the artificial way the sunlight bounces off the waxy leaves)

by constanted



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: (with C2E28 and C2E96 heavily featured as well), Abandonment Issues, Angst, C2E100, Character Study, Dissociation, Gen, Having Faith, Isolation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:14:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25060687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/constanted/pseuds/constanted
Summary: The water boils far too quickly. He thinks it used to take longer than it does now.(or: caduceus clay & the nature of change, in three parts)
Relationships: Caduceus Clay & Clay Family, Caduceus Clay & The Mighty Nein
Comments: 22
Kudos: 129





	disintegrating trees (the artificial way the sunlight bounces off the waxy leaves)

**Author's Note:**

> spoilers for e100! holy shit!
> 
> i've been trying to work something out about cad's isolation for... a long time, now. i had a draft written up after 96 came out, but it was really unpolished, and while working to clean it up during hiatus led to me trashing it entirely. and then e100 happened, and i have thoughts! title is from this lovely (and Very Cad) [song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEggO_aqX5w). and just because it was my listening material as i wrote this, here's a link to my cad [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1mFAI0ENJTx6wTOYWNacnJ?si=PDL7lmyjRP6OoYrbPHn1tQ)
> 
> light warnings for portrayal of dissociation & depersonalization, implied disordered eating, memory loss, and caduceus-typical emotional repression.

**PART ONE: CALL TO ADVENTURE**

The worst day, he thinks, was the day he threw a rock through the stained glass window because he realized he’d forgotten the last thing that Bell ever said to him before she and Colton left. She’d whispered it, he knew, and it was raining, and it was morning.

(Maybe it was snowing, actually, and it was definitely not too bright out, so it could have been evening or even night? He quickly decided, of course, to stick with a rainy morning, at risk of breaking another window. All the mirrors are broken already.)

But that day was a good amount of time ago. Definitely a few seasons, maybe a year, maybe even a few years. He’s never been very good at timekeeping, and it’s not like it matters much, here—change is measured only in terms of the corruption’s tightening embrace and in visitors, who are often of unpleasant character. Time has certainly passed--he no longer casts an augury each morning, and he can grow a full beard, and he can cut his own hair without looking in any mirrors. Mostly because looking in mirrors is terribly inconvenient, of late.

Regardless, there are visitors this morning, and he woke up from what he thinks would have been a very important dream to see what they were doing. His voice is hoarse from disuse, though, so he is making tea first. 

The water boils far too quickly. He thinks it used to take longer than it does now. And as he’s thinking that, the water is suddenly boiling over and winding up on his hand. It doesn’t hurt, and even if it did, he knows it would be rude to keep his company waiting much longer. Five sets of footfalls, he thinks; at least three distinct voices.

(He is very good at scoping out dangerous things, or potentially-dangerous things. This, unlike timekeeping, is something he thinks is a very useful skill for him to have.)

The visitors are not so dangerous, at least not to him. They are in mourning, but they carry no corpse, and they are not here for burial services at all; they heard there was a witch in the woods. His stomach twists in some terrible combination of excitement and guilt. The feeling is so overpowering that he misses a few of their questions, things they say about him to each other. But then one of them asks how long he’s been alone, and he’s very much back, and he very much doesn’t have a good answer, so he says a number that sounds right, and while they question his use of seasons, they seem to accept it as fact, which is good. These people are hurt, they needn’t worry about his confusion.

(They do comment on it an awful lot, though; Miss Keg says it’s clear he doesn’t get out much, Miss Beau points out that he rambles on and on; Mister Caleb calls him our-new-tall-hermit-companion. And Miss Beau is looking up at him while writing in a little book as she walks, sometimes. She is definitely not drawing him. And Miss Nila keeps asking about his tribe, and Miss Nott just asks far too many questions. Caduceus likes that, actually, likes that all of these people ask so many questions, because he also enjoys asking questions, but it’s still a little bit uncomfortable, and a little bit sad when he doesn’t know answers to things he probably should know.)

He notices a tree that it usually takes much less time to walk to. He points this out, and Mister Caleb says it has not been very much time at all, and he purses his lips, and then gives a sad sort-of-smile and returns to his conversation with Miss Nott.

Days later—days are certainly a concept, two or three meals and conversations and everything—Miss Beau asks him if he’s enjoying the outside world. She’s mostly teasing—all of these people are very skilled in playing a role, rather than simply being, which is awfully sad, in Caduceus’ eyes. He is very much himself, and he likes that, he likes being calm and responsible and a just a little bit weird and also home, that’s always—

Well, he’ll ignore his own bad habits for now. Miss Beau waves a hand in front of his face and says, “You good, Caddy?” which is a very fun nickname, and Caduceus nods, responds with, “I was just distracted, sorry, um. I’m… it’s a lot? But I like you people, and I like shopping, and, um, I like… new things. Yeah. Yeah,” he nods, “It’s really nice.”

“Y’know, Jes is also kinda new to all this outside-world shit, if you ever wanna, like, talk with her about it. It kinda fucked her up, being stuck, I think, even if her mom’s cool.”

Caduceus nods again, and files away that information—he doesn’t want to upset Miss Jester with bad memories, so he won’t initiate. He is too overwhelmed, anyway, as silly as it seems. Time passes strangely, and he cooks and he eats more in a day than he usually did in—more than a day. 

Mister Caleb’s words echo,  _ we are your destiny _ , and he really, really believes it.

**PART TWO: MORTIFYING ORDEALS**

In the cave, he has a dream where he is surrounded by statues, which is maybe a little bit ridiculous, because he is also surrounded by statues in reality. He is a statue, also, but he is being molded and changed and shaped, still, unfired clay (ha!), while the others stand kiln-fired, incomplete, and eroding. Somehow, he is happy about it, smiles at the sculptors.

He told Calliope that he’s changed, and she thinks it’s temporary, and she thinks even more that it’s confusing. 

(She twitched her right ear in that way of hers, her hands tapped on the ground in a little pattern. She is a flood of forgotten things that is a little bit overwhelming, and he loves her, and he can’t be around her much longer or else he’ll just break, he thinks, and, well, breaking is not a thing he should do.)

(Well. Neither is piracy, and neither is drunken flirtation, and neither is fighting dragons, and neither is staying with these people that he loves, and neither is fighting gods, but, well, those are things he’s done regardless of shoulds, so. Maybe he’ll break, eventually. But he can’t do it tonight or tomorrow.)

He wakes midway through, not wanting to wallow in this too-proud joy, and steps cautiously over bodies to go for a walk. Fjord and Yasha both wake, Yasha patting him on the ankle gently as if to say go ahead, and Fjord mouthing okay? at him, settling back into sleep after a nod and a mouthed you’re sure? and a second nod. He makes his way through the caverns, hair still dripping wet, sure of where he’s going.

It’s been ten years. Or, rather, eight, since Bell and Colton left. He thinks.Ironically, there is very much a symbol of Avandra carved and painted right behind the too-still forms of the two of them. He laughs, a little bit, and quietly thanks Her for watching over them, maybe, even if they’ve been forced to stray from Her domain.

(Bell should be grown by now, he thinks. But she isn’t. She looks exactly the same. Colton’s hands are precariously holding a little pink dick statuette, and Caduceus removes it after some deliberation, slips it into his pocket.)

He fidgets with the diamond dust in his pocket, knows he’s out of magic until he’s a bit more rested, but tries to restore his sister regardless, feels a little breeze of an apology, something like a hand on his shoulder. He thanks Her, too, and it’s almost like She disagrees with his gratitude. He buries that thought, decides to try and sleep. He doesn’t do very well. But he heals his siblings in the morning regardless.

Jester tries to joke about how old he is, and Caduceus corrects her, and changes the subject from how he’s changed before he goes through that whole process he went through with thinking about Calliope last night again. He can’t do that with her, he knows. He can do it with Colton; he’s great at avoiding Colton.

And he’s even forgotten a good amount of that.

A decade is a lot of time; two hands worth of it.

He avoids conversations when he can, terrified of slipping into an old self around the Nein or a new self around his family. He (jokingly!) regrets thanking Avandra, because he thinks She maybe cursed him with this situation. (And how wrong of him is it that he’s thinking about that now, when he should be caring for his family, who have been trapped so long. A decade.)

There is, somewhere, a compromise between selves, he hopes. A good son and a good cleric, a member of the Mighty Nein, and—

And himself.

He looks at Fjord down at the bar in Uthodurn, at Beau, at Jester, at Yasha, at Caleb, at Nott. He smiles. And he knocks on his parents’ door, and he does something he’s been good at his whole life, and he lies to them. Old habits, or whatever it is he heard Beau say that one time.

It’s not a lie, really. He does want to go home someday, he thinks. Maybe not forever—he’ll process that sick feeling later—but he wants to go home and see it beautiful and safe and alive.

He’s never seen it safe and alive before.

But he lies, and he pretends this new selfhood is temporary, and he tells his siblings he loves them, and he leaves, and his shoulders feel lighter than they’ve ever felt.

**PART THREE: SELF-RECOGNITION THROUGH THE OTHER**

They remember nothing and they call it destiny. 

Caduceus would maybe have a full panic attack, were it not for the Nein’s very obvious collective sense of dread and the total nightmare these last few weeks (save for the peace talks, of course) have been (the water, Fjord, Fjord, the dragon turtle, the water again), He’s maybe a little bit numb to this sort of thing, even when it’s a broken mirror and he can’t stop staring at it and asking questions he used to hate hearing.

He’s not sure the others have noticed, thankfully, all occupied with their own concerns—the Empire folks with the scientific and arcane details, Jester with her cult business, Fjord with all this talk of shipwrecked sailors (oh, wow, oh no, that’ll be bad), and Yasha with maybe getting poisoned a few minutes ago.

And he wants to tell them to leave, and he wants to ask Melora what is happening, and maybe he shouldn’t ask Melora, if blind faith is what got these people into this situation, but Caduceus’ faith isn’t blind and it’s always been with him.

They don’t know how long they’ve been here. Two hands worth of time, he thinks, to himself.

He knows his name, he decides. He knows where he is from, and who he comes from, and who he is with, and he’s working on knowing who he is, and--

And he’s terrified that this is it. Two lycanthropes who don’t  _ care _ about the world outside of their home, no desire to leave, that’s him, too.

He straightens his shoulders, thaumaturgies his eyes a bit more when only Yasha’s looking. She smiles. He smiles back. He picks up a stone.

He exhales.

It’s gonna be a rough Travelercon.

**Author's Note:**

> comment and kudo, please! i'm happy that cr is back! yeehaw! tumblr @ yahooanswer


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